More on Mike Green

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Still, I don’t think Green can rest easy yet. I’ve been very high on him all camp, but Hanlon echoed what I blogged about after the first period last night - in spurts Mike Green looks like a future 15-goal, 60-point difference maker on the blue line, and he also still has defensive lapses and/or takes bad penalties.\

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“Greenie - that’s his game,” Hanlon said when asked about the end-to-end rush that looked a lot like this. “We’re working through youthful mistakes with him. The thing that we love and makes us patient with it is he has the ability to win hockey games. We like the way he skates, we like the way he carries the puck. For his next part of his development and for us to really like him is do all of the things well system-wise and in our own end.”\

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So yes, Mike Green has played well. But he also only played a little more than 14 minutes last night. By comparison, Jeff Schultz - who I have continued to think is going to be an odd man out - logged 24:45 and played in all situations. I think it will boil down to whether or not the coaching staff trusts Green’s defensive game enough, because they clearly would like to have his injection of offense in the lineup. And if Green is sent down, it might actually be because of his play in preseason games - at the defensive end.\

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I’ll check in later after another wonderful afternoon trek up I-95 to the “City of Brotherly Teetering on the Edge of Phillies Paranoia.”\